The role of women in ancient warfare differed from culture to culture. Warfare throughout written history mainly has been portrayed in modern times as a matter for men, but women also have played a role. Until very recently, little mention of these exploits was included in retellings of history in most countries, aside from the Amazons.

Female deities, whose origins predate historical records, are present in most early cultures. Often they were portrayed as warriors, which signals a pervasive presence of women among such activities prior to a profound change in many human cultures after the adoption of agriculture as the typical sustenance (and which enabled protracted warfare with large armies).

Their influences, the roles of women rulers, and those of significant women, were retained in many of these cultures so strongly that no layers of new legends, ideals, and myths were able to obscure them completely.

The following is a list of prominent women who participated in warfare, which was assembled from the fragmentary beginning of written records to approximately 500 AD. Archaeological research provides more details and clues regularly.

17th century BC – Ahhotep I is credited with a stela at Karnak for "having pulled Egypt together, having cared for its army, having guarded it, having brought back those who fled, gathering up its deserters, having quieted the South, subduing those who defy her".[1]

Ahhotep II is buried with a dagger and axe, as well as three golden fly pendants, which were given as rewards for military valor. However, it is debated as to whether or not they actually belong to her.[2]

13th century BC – Lady Fu Hao consort of the Chinese emperor Wu Ding, led 3,000 men into battle[8] during the Shang Dynasty. Fu Hao had entered the royal household by marriage and took advantage of the semi-matriarchal slave society to rise through the ranks.[9] Fu Hao is known to modern scholars mainly from inscriptions on Shang Dynastyoracle bone artifacts unearthed at Yinxu.[10] In these inscriptions she is shown to have led numerous military campaigns. The Tu fought against the Shang for generations until they finally were defeated by Fu Hao in a single decisive battle. Further campaigns against the neighbouring Yi, Qiang, and Ba followed, the latter is particularly remembered as the earliest recorded large scale ambush in Chinese history. With up to 13,000 troops and the important generals Zhi and Hou Gao serving under her, she was the most powerful military leader of her time.[11] This highly unusual status is confirmed by the many weapons, including great battle-axes, unearthed from her tomb.[12]

Late 9th century – 8th century BC[30] – According to Geoffrey of Monmouth, Queen Cordelia, on whom the character in Shakespeare's King Lear is based, battled her nephews for control of her kingdom.[31] However, Geoffrey of Monmouth is not considered a reliable historical source.[19]

660 BC – Lady Xu Mu is credited with saving the state of Wey from military invasion with her appeals for aid. The Wey people remembered her for bringing supplies, getting military aid and rebuilding the state. She is also the first recorded female poet in Chinese history.[36]

654 BC – Lampsacus is founded by the Greeks.[37] According to Greek legendary history, written centuries later, a Bebryces woman named Lampsace informed the Greeks of a plot against them by the Bebryces, and thus enabled them to conquer the area and found the city, which was named in her honor. She was deified and worshiped as a goddess.[38][39][40]

480 BC[62] – Greek diver Hydna and her father sabotaged enemy ships before a critical battle, thus causing the Greeks to win.[63]

460–425 BC [64] – Greek historian Herodotus[65] described Scythian Amazons.[66] Historian Herodotus,[67] recorded that queen Tomyris of the Massagetae fought and defeated Cyrus the Great.[68] He also records the Zaueces people of Ancient Libya, whom he describes as having their women drive their chariots to war, as well as the festival of Athena Tritogenia among the Ausean people, whose young women are divided into two groups and fight each other with stones and sticks.[69] This festival, taking place in Ancient Libya, describes the girls from the Machlyans and Auseans tribes fighting each other, and those who died were labeled false virgins.[70]

4th century BC – Onomaris is estimated to have lived at around this time period.[77] According to Tractatus De Mulieribus, she led her people in migration to a new land and conquered the local inhabitants.[78]

4th century BC – Cynane, a half-sister to Alexander the Great, accompanied her father on a military campaign and killed an Illyrian leader named Caeria in hand-to-hand combat, and defeated the Illyrian army.[79]

4th century BC[80] – Pythagorean philosopher, Timycha, was captured by Sicilian soldiers during a battle. She and her husband were the only survivors. She is admired for her defiance after capture, because while being questioned by the Sicilian tyrant, she bit off her tongue and spat it at his feet.[81]

4th century BC – Chinese statesman Shang Yang wrote The Book of Lord Shang,[82] in which he recommended dividing the members of an army into three categories; strong men, strong women, and the weak and old of both sexes. He recommended that the strong men serve as the first line of defence, that the strong women defend the forts and build traps, and that the weak and elderly of both sexes control the supply chain. He also recommended that these three groups not be intermingled, on the basis that doing so would be detrimental to morale.[83]

339 BC – Mania became of satrap Dardanus.[84]Polyaenus described her as going into battle riding in a chariot, and as being such an excellent general that she was never defeated.[85]

335 BC – Timoclea, after being raped by one of Alexander the Great's soldiers during his attack on Thebes, pushed her rapist down a well and killed him. Alexander was so impressed with her cunning in luring him to the well that he ordered her to be released and that she not be punished for killing his soldier.[86]

332 BC – The Nubian queen, Candace of Meroe, intimidated Alexander the Great with her armies and her strategy while confronting him, causing him to avoid Nubia, instead heading to Egypt, according to Pseudo-Callisthenes.[89] However, Pseudo-Callisthenes is not considered a reliable source, and it is possible that the entire event is fiction.[90] More reliable historical accounts indicate that Alexander never attacked Nubia and never attempted to move farther south than the oasis of Siwa in Egypt.[91]

331 BC– Alexander the Great and his troops burned down Persepolis several months after its capture; traditionally Thaïs (a hetaera who accompanied Alexander on campaigns) suggested it when they were drunk, but others record that it had been discussed previously.[92]

272 BC – Pyrrhus of Epirus, the conqueror and source of the term pyrrhic victory, according to Plutarch died while fighting an urban battle in Argos when an old woman threw a roof tile at him, stunning him and allowing an Argive soldier to kill him.[112]

271 BC – A group of Gothic women who were captured by Romans while fighting in the same garb as their male peers, were paraded through Rome wearing signs that said, "Amazons".[113]

217 BC – Arsinoe III of Egypt accompanied Ptolemy IV at the Battle of Raphia. When the battle went poorly, she appeared before the troops and exhorted them to fight to defend their families. She also promised two minas of gold to each of them if they won the battle, which they did.[114]

2nd century BC – Queen Stratonice convinced Docimus to leave his stronghold, and her forces took him captive.[118]

2nd century BC – The Book of Judith was probably written at this time.[119] It describes Judith as assassinating Holofernes, an enemy general.[120] However, this incident is regarded by historians fictional due to the historical anachronisms within the text.[121]

Late 2nd century BC[122] – Amage, a Sarmatian queen, attacked a Scythian prince who was making incursions onto her protectorates. She rode to Scythia with 120 warriors, where she killed his guards, his friends, his family, and ultimately, killed the prince himself. She allowed his son to live on the condition that he obey her.[123]

186 BC – Chiomara, a Galatian princess, was captured in a battle between Rome and the Galatians and was raped by a centurion. After a reversal she ordered him killed by her companions, and she had him beheaded after he was dead. She then delivered his head to her husband.[124]

2nd century BC – Queen Rhodogune of Parthia was informed of a rebellion while preparing for her bath. She vowed not to brush her hair until the rebellion was ended. She waged a long war to suppress the rebellion, and won it without breaking her vow.[125]

138 BC – The Roman, Sextus Junius Brutus found that in Lusitania the women were "fighting and perishing in company with the men with such bravery that they uttered no cry even in the midst of slaughter". He also noted that the Bracari women were "bearing arms with the men, who fought never turning, never showing their backs, or uttering a cry."[126]

102 BC – A battle between Romans and the TeutonicAmbrones at Aquae Sextiae took place during this time. Plutarch described that "the fight had been no less fierce with the women than with the men themselves... the women charged with swords and axes and fell upon their opponents uttering a hideous outcry."[128]

102/101 BC[129] – General Marius of the Romans fought the TeutonicCimbrians. Cimbrian women accompanied their men into war, created a line in battle with their wagons and fought with poles and lances,[130] as well as staves, stones, and swords.[131] When the Cimbrian women saw that defeat was imminent, they killed their children and committed suicide rather than be taken as captives.[132]

1st century - There were detailed reports of women accompanying their men on Germanic battlefields to provide morale support. Tacitus mentions them twice; in his Germania and again in his Annals, specifically at the battle near modern Nijmegen when the XV Primigenia and V Alaudae legions were sent packing back to Castra Vetera where they were later besieged during the Revolt of the Batavi. He writes in detail how the women would gather behind the warhost, and show their breasts to flagging warriors while screaming that their loss that day would mean the enemy gaining these as slaves. Women held an honored position in German tribes, and were seen as holy spirits as shown by their adoration of such as Aurinia and Veleda. Slavery was the fate of cowards and the unlucky - and letting one's women fall into that fate was a hideous deed. Thus the men were encouraged to fight harder. [138]

1st century – A Sarmatian woman was buried with weapons in what is now modern Russia.[139]

1st century – A woman was entombed with a sword in Tabriz, Iran. The tomb was discovered in 2004.[140]

21 – Debate erupted as to whether or not the wives of Roman governors should accompany their husbands in the provinces. Caecina Severus said that they should not, because they "paraded among the soldiers" and that "a woman had presided at the exercises of the cohorts and the manoeuvres of the legions".[148]

378 – Roman Empress Albia Dominica organized her people in defense against the invading Goths after her husband had died in battle.[164]

450 – A Moche woman was buried with two ceremonial war clubs and twenty-eight spear throwers. The South American grave is discovered in 2006, and is the first known grave of a Moche woman to contain weapons.[165]

4th–6th century: Possible time period that the legendary woman warrior Hua Mulan may have lived.[166]